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Cromon
Group Two, Page F
The resolution to interfere in the war once taken, the European powers lost no time in finding a way to end the conflict, and with this object in mind they forced on the belligerents two successive armistices, culminating in the two peace conferences of London. These armistices served two purposes from the diplomatic point of view; first, they exhausted financially the little Balkan countries; and, secondly, they prepared public opinion for the acceptance of any peace terms. The second conference in London succeeded in forcing a peace treaty on the Balkan States. With the exception of Bulgaria, who hoped to retain most of the Turkish territory won by the Balkan coalition, every one was dissatisfied with the way the London conference ended.
Sir Edward Grey, then and now Foreign Secretary of State for Great Britain, making the first announcement of the rupture between Turkey and the Balkan States, said--exposing the views not only of his Government but of the European concert as well--that Europe, being taken unawares, would not permit any alteration of the Balkan frontiers as the result of the war. After the first victories of the Balkan allies we see Great Britain changing her policy. "The Balkan victors shall not be deprived of the fruits of their victories," Premier Asquith was declaring in Parliament less than a fortnight after Sir Edward spoke. In both these instances the British statesmen were voicing the policy of the European concert taken as a whole. In the first place, the Foreign Secretary was led into believing that Turkey might prove victorious against the Balkan coalition, and the warning about the immutability of the Balkan frontiers was only for Turkey, in case her victorious armies were to cross the boundaries into Bulgaria, Servia, Montenegro, and Greece.
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